If you thought the Egyptian Pyramids were the only interesting thing, then you thought wrong. Grand pyramids, strong pharaohs, and mysteries buried beneath the desert sands for millennia are frequently conjured up when people think of ancient Egypt. The stone temples, painted tombs, and gilded treasures serve as a reminder of a civilisation that awed the world with its beauty, might, and knowledge. Egypt’s legacy was shaped by the everyday lives of farmers, artisans, priests, and families who lived behind all the monuments and mummies. However, modern science is changing all that.
Unexpected ancestry is revealed by the first ancient Egyptian genome to be sequenced
DNA obtained from the remains of a man who lived in ancient Egypt around the time the first pyramids were built is providing evidence of the ties between two great cultures of the period, with a fifth of his genetic ancestry traced to Mesopotamia. Although based on a single genome, the findings offer unique insight into the genetic history of ancient Egyptians.
A difficult task considering that Egypt’s hot climate is not conducive to DNA preservation. The researchers extracted DNA from the roots of two teeth, part of the man’s skeletal remains that had been interred for millennia inside a large sealed ceramic vessel within a rock-cut tomb. They then managed to sequence his whole genome, a first for any person who lived in ancient Egypt.
The discovery is of an old man who was 60 more than 4000 years ago
The man lived roughly 4,500-4,800 years ago, the researchers said, around the beginning of a period of prosperity and stability called the Old Kingdom, known for the construction of immense pyramids as monumental pharaonic tombs. The ceramic vessel was excavated in 1902 at a site called Nuwayrat near the village of Beni Hassan, approximately 170 miles (270 km) south of Cairo.
The researchers said the man was about 60 years old when he died, and that aspects of his skeletal remains hinted at the possibility that he had worked as a potter. The DNA showed that the man descended mostly from local populations, with about 80% of his ancestry traced to Egypt or adjacent parts of North Africa. But about 20% of his ancestry was traced to a region of the ancient Near East called the Fertile Crescent.
Population geneticist Adeline Morez Jacobs of Liverpool John Moores University in England and the Francis Crick Institute in London, lead author of the study published on Wednesday in the journal Nature, said,
“This suggests substantial genetic connections between ancient Egypt and the eastern Fertile Crescent.”
Ancient history perception shifted
Ancient civilisations were long thought to be isolated and distinct. However, recent studies such as this one demonstrate that human history is far more interconnected than previously believed. Egypt’s history includes migration, openness, and interaction in addition to pyramids and pharaohs. Right now, there is even more hope that researchers can discover more ancient Egyptian mysteries.
Francis Crick Institute population geneticist and study co-author Pontus Skoglund said,
“Ancient DNA recovery from Egyptian remains has been exceptionally challenging due to Egypt’s hot climate that accelerates DNA degradation, with high temperatures breaking down genetic material over time compared to cooler, more stable environments.”
The fact that his burial occurred before mummification became standard practice in Egypt may have helped avoid DNA degradation because his remains were spared elaborate preservation techniques. Scientists have struggled to recover ancient Egyptian genomes, according to paleogeneticist and study co-author Linus Girdland Flink of the University of Aberdeen in Scotland. One previous effort yielded partial genome sequencing of three individuals who lived some 1,500 years after the Nuwayrat man. We are more convinced that history carries such a rich mystery.
GCN.com/Reuters.
